Turkey: Islamic school reform passed

Erdogan uses parliamentary strength, vote preceded by protests

(ANSAmed) - ANKARA, MARCH 30 - Realising a decades-old objective
amid protest from the secular opposition, Turkey's moderate
Islamic premier Recep Tayyip Erdogan has pushed through a reform
today that favours the Koranic institutions, introduces an hour
of Muslim religious instruction and exposes girls to danger of
being kept at home away from school.
Thanks to an overwhelming parliamentary majority thanks to a
near 50% majority at last June's general election, the Justice
and Development Party (AKP) has pushed through a controversial
education law with 295 votes in favour and 91 against. Three
days of street protest preceded this vote, two of them being
supressed by the use of water cannon and tear gas and opposition
parties raised banners before leaving the lower house.
Known by the formula ''4+4+4'', the reforms prolong compulsory
schooling from eight to 12 years but divides this period up into
three segments of four years: in this, opposition parties see a
danger of promoting an exodus from schools and into child labour
and above all into the "Imam Hatip Lisesi", the Islamic
religious schools such as the one attended by Erdogan and,
according to sources, four out of ten ministers in his
government.
These schools are in the tradition of closed Madrases banned by
the founder of modern Turkey, Kemal Ataturk, who gave Muslim
Anatolia a modern, European direction. Although they returned,
the Imam-Hatip were penalised by the generals following the
anti-Islamic military coup of 1997, preventing the admission to
them of children (boys) aged under fifteen. At his access to
power in 2003, Erdogan obtained a reduction to 10 for boys
studying to be Imams.
The introduction of optional Islamic religious h (the Koran and
the life of Mohammed) to secondary schools has also been
criticised over the past week as further Islamisation, although
opportunities for Christian, Hebrew and other religions are
provided for. This alleged turn to religious schools was
presaged by the premier in January in a speech speaking of
''religious youth''. Until now, the 540 religious institutes
have had around 300,000 children (just 2% of Turkey's 18 million
school children.
The showdown in parliament has been so fierce that three weeks
ago opposition MPs came to blows with those of Erdogan's party.
Also criticised by the lay wing of Turkey's business community
(Tusiad) is that part of the reform allowing for distance
education, which poor or Islamic families could use to send boys
out to work or keep girls veiled at home.
The Prime Minister has rejected such criticisms over the past
week, saying that this ''historic'' reform education-inspired
reform was needed to heal the ''wound'' inflicted by
''non-democratic forces''. This was a reference to the military
coup of 1997 that ousted premier
Necmettin Erbakan, Erdogan's mentor. (ANSAmed).